.jpg)
Whilst sitting in the auditorium there was a faint speaker playing
various Frankie Valli songs, people humming along, and a general buzz of
excitement, as there often is minutes before a live show begins. Then we popped into life with a lively rendition of ‘Oh What A Night (December 63)’ but in
French, as explained, it reached No. 1 in France in march 2000, where it stayed
for 15 weeks!
We’re walked and talked through the story of The Four Lovers,
wait, no, The Variatones - who knows?, and after several failed attempts to break the
music scene, friend to the group, Joe Pesci (George Salmon), yes, that Joe
Pesci, introduces them to Bob Gaudio (Blair Gibson). Neither party seems really
interested until a young Frankie Castelluccio (Michael Pickering) slid into his
mesmerising falsetto, and the rest is history. The Four Seasons were born. We
follow their epic rise to superstardom, the highs and the lows of life on the
road, family troubles, friendships on edge, the ever-present need for more hits
until the realisation that guitarist Tommy Devito (Dalton Wood) is three
quarters of a million dollars in debt using band funds, after some shady deals
and an all-too-familiar celebrities' allergy to paying taxes. The band vow to pay off Tommy’s debts, as he
gets whisked off to Las Vegas for ‘safety’, bass player Nick Massi (Lewis
Griffiths) quits the band, leaving Franky and Bobby left to clear up the mess.
Working every waking moment, Frankie eventually digs the band out of the
million-dollar hole, and we end the show in 1990, just as the band get inducted
to the Rock and Roll 'Hall of Fame'.
The cast of this show
were all excellent singers, which seems like it would be a given, a show about
a boy band, but its not always the case. The four principals all blended together wonderfully
and had that classic '60’s doo-wap sound that I was hoping for. Not only that,
when it came to the acting side of the gig, they all were first rate, being
able to switch on a dime, from global superstar to husband in trouble with the
wife, or being a tough guy switching to play ‘um-chucks’ on a guitar whilst
singing about loving you, it was all so seamlessly done. Pickering’s falsetto
was brilliant, if not a tad piercing at points, but that is to be expected from
the style of the music. The supporting cast were all strong in their roles,
most of which played several characters during the performance.
Sergio Trujillo. Take a bow. The choreography was stunning. Which is a sentence I didn’t expect to be
writing from this show, but my word. I was blown away. The moves were sharp,
they were well executed, they were over the top, and they were so tight that it
was flawless. All while singing, miming an instrument, and performing to camera
at points. Brilliant, brilliant work.
The costume department had quite an amount of work to do,
but the changes weren’t really full changes, as my wife pointed out, the
principals kept the same trousers on, and just switched shirts and blazers
(roughly) 50 times during the show. In fact, the rest of the cast did have a
lot of changes, so I imagine the costume department will have an articulated
lorry just for themselves on this tour, there were so many.
The band. This is an interesting one, as unlike most shows,
most of the band were actually in the wings, as they made several cameo
appearances throughout the show, as The Four Seasons's backing band, but the
drummer, Stephen Fawbert, was onstage for the whole show, set up on a remote-controlled plinth, he was guided around the stage, and featured at the back of
every scene, song and piece of action, only being hidden by a drop-in tab when
he wasn’t in a scene. I think there was only 2 minutes where he wasn’t on stage
during the show, and that’s when his drum kit was the scene of a conversation
between Gaudio and Valli. Then he came flying back out to accompany the
following song, so a highly worthy mention to him. Bravo.
The lighting was generally befitting of a group of low lives,
huddled around a street lamp (which didn’t have a bulb in it) mostly dark and
dingy lighting, except when we were backstage at a Four Seasons's gig, and we
were all woken up by the blinders at the back of the stage. And then for the
rest of the show there wasn't anything nothing spectacular. The sound was great, a good mix
between band and singers, and every word of dialect was crystal clear.
This tour is fabulous. If you get the opportunity to see
this show as it travels the country, I would strongly encourage you to make
every effort to get yourself into a theatre and watch it as you will be
entertained greatly for a couple of hours and you’ll leave the theatre with so
many tunes whizzing around your head that you’ll end up (much like I did)
making your own Four Seasons mega-mix on the journey home. The work that
director Des McAnuff and team have done is spectacular and you’ll be a fool to
miss it!
Reviewer - Simon Oliver
on - 27.6.22
No comments:
Post a Comment